Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 13, 2025 / 17:50 pm (CNA).
Diocese of Boise Bishop Peter F. Christensen raised concerns about a “culture of death” and threats to human dignity after Idaho made death by firing squad its primary method of execution for death row inmates.
“Whether we live in Idaho or anywhere else in the world, Catholics need to stand firm on the Gospel we preach,” Christensen said. “Therefore, we oppose this means of execution and every other form of capital punishment. We are people who strive to promote redemption and peace.”
The bishop said in a statement provided to CNA Thursday afternoon that “Christians are called to oppose the culture of death” and “a person’s dignity is not lost even after committing grave crimes.” He noted that the government can protect the community by incarcerating the person “while avoiding definitively depriving the guilty of the possibility of redemption.”
“In light of the Gospel of mercy and hope, our response to the death penalty is not based on what the condemned have done but who we are in Christ,” Christensen said. “The Catholic Church recognizes that it is the right and duty of every government to maintain law and order. While doing so, the sanctity of life and the dignity of every human being must also be safeguarded.”
Christensen cited the Beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew, in which Christ said: “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.” He also cited the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which holds that the death penalty “is inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person” (No. 2267).
Governor defends new law
Idaho Gov. Brad Little, a Republican, signed the bill this week to make death by firing squad the default method of execution for every person on death row in the state. Per the legislation, lethal injection will be the backup method of execution if, for any reason, the state cannot carry out an execution using a firing squad.
“I have long made clear my support of capital punishment,” Little said in a statement provided to CNA.
“My signing of [this bill] is consistent with my support of the Idaho Legislature’s actions in setting the policies around methods of execution in the state of Idaho,” Little added. “As governor, my job is to follow the law and ensure that lawful criminal sentences are carried out as ordered by the courts.”
The state has carried out three executions since 1957 with the most recent occurring more than 12 and a half years ago in June 2012. Those three executions were all completed through lethal injection.
Idaho attempted to execute convicted serial killer Thomas Creech by lethal injection in 2024, but the medical team was unable to establish an intravenous line to carry out the lethal injection after eight attempts over the course of an hour. A federal judge temporarily halted his execution after the botched lethal injection attempt.
Creech is one of nine people currently on death row in Idaho.
Shift from lethal injection to firing squad
Idaho banned executions by firing squad in 2009 but later reversed that ban in 2023 when the state made executions by firing squad the backup method. At the time, lethal injection was the primary method for executions.
Executions by firing squad are permitted in five states, but the new law will make Idaho the only state in which death by firing squad is the primary form of execution. The new law goes into effect on July 1, 2026.
Only four death row inmates in the United States have been executed by a firing squad since 1977, with the most recent occurring in South Carolina just last week. South Carolina recently brought back this method of execution because of a shortage of drugs for lethal injection.
Many states have had trouble obtaining the drugs for lethal injection over the past two decades because drug manufacturers have refused to sell the products amid public pressure from death penalty opponents and moral qualms about ending human life.
“As lethal injection drugs become harder to procure, either because pharmaceutical companies refuse to sell their drugs for this purpose or because of rampant botched lethal injections, we have seen states seeking additional methods of execution,” Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, the executive director of Catholic Mobilizing Network, told CNA.
“We are witnessing that some states are so hellbent on pursuing executions that they’ll go to distant lengths in order to take these lives,” she said. “Catholic Mobilizing Network will continue to oppose legislation that promotes executions because this is clearly a direct affront to the sanctity of life and the inviolability of human dignity.”
Catholic Mobilizing Network works closely with the United States Conference of Catholic bishops on efforts to oppose the death penalty.
“Whether someone is shot, electrocuted, injected, or gassed, each and every execution extinguishes a God-given life with inherent dignity and worth,” Murphy said. “Each and every execution is a blatant act of state-sanctioned violence.”
Some states have also brought back executions by the electric chair and others have approved different drugs to carry out lethal injections.
Last year, Alabama became the first state to execute inmates by forcing them to inhale nitrogen gas. Louisiana also intends to execute inmates with nitrogen, but the first scheduled execution with this method was temporarily halted by a judge this week.
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So sick and tired of Bishops pushing this “Seamless Garment” garbage which has gone way past it’s expiration date and has done nothing to create a genuine culture of life and only served as a cover for pro-abort, pro-euthanasia, pro-child mutilation “Catholic” politicians in the US and elsewhere in the world. Time to de-deify Cardinal Bernardin and his ideology.
“Whether someone is shot, electrocuted, injected, or gassed, each and every execution extinguishes a God-given life with inherent dignity and worth,” Murphy said. “Each and every execution is a blatant act of state-sanctioned violence.”
Would Mrs Murphy readily accept the substitution of the word “murder” for “violence”?
Whether her answer would be yes or no, where in Scripture or Tradition do we find the divine integral repeal of the law of capital jurisdiction that was given through Noah?
So the message of the Gospel is pro-firing squads, Johann?
Maybe do a quick brush-up on EVANGELIUM VITAE.
The definitive teaching in Evangelium Vitae concerning the absolute inviolability of innocent human life has an inerrancy guaranteed by the Holy Spirit – but that inerrancy depends on the use of the word “innocent”.
I don’t want to give the govt. that sort of power over life & death, no matter what the manner of execution may be.
It always puzzles me that folks who don’t trust the state to count election votes, educate our children in public schools, or use our tax dollars properly will be the same ones who endorse a state death penalty.
“I don’t want to give the govt. that sort of power over life & death, no matter what the manner of execution.”
It’s not up to you. The government, by It’s very nature and purpose has the authority to create laws, enforce them, and then administer consequences to those who violate the law. That includes the death penalty.
It’s true it’s not up to us individuals but as Christian voters we can make a difference. And laws concerning the death penalty vary by state.
Yes. And we should be boring for those who will support and uphold the death penalty in the interests of justice.
What method would you prefer?
Even the bishops including Pope Francis himself trip up on the lesson taught by our Lord Jesus regarding the death penalty.
So, let’s review it again – (Luke 23:39-43)
Gestas, the bad thief, says to the crucified Jesus, “If you are the Christ, save yourself and us.”
The good thief, Dismas, rebukes Gestas, saying, “Do you not even fear God, seeing that you are under the same sentence? And we, indeed justly, for we are receiving what our deeds deserved; but this man has done nothing wrong.”
And Dismas said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And Jesus said to him, “Amen I say to you, this day you shall be with me in paradise.”
Note first whatJesus did not say. Our Lord did not respond to Gestas, nor did He say one word regarding the injustice of the death penalty. In fact, Jesus turns the whole death penalty issue around by focusing on the incredible grace that can be had by right and lawful execution, depending upon the attitude of the criminal being executed. Jesus does this by saying to Dismas – Because you accept this punishment as just, your death pays for the debt of all the sins on your soul such that you have no more suffering owed, i.e., Purgatory, and at the very moment of your death, your soul will go straight to Heaven.
Jesus did not direct his statement to the bad thief, Gestas, because he chose to die unrepentant.
Instead of making the death penalty a social justice issue, the Catholic faithful should work more on ministering to those under the death penalty, so, like Dismas, their souls, properly disposed to repentance and contrition, go straight to Heaven at the hour of their death.
And, the Catholic Church should honor Saint Dismas as the patron saint of the legitimately condemned.
And we do not executive thieves.
Having worked in a Corrections environment for a short time; I can tell you that while it is true that modern incarceration methods do protect the peaceable public from violence; there are other parties that need to be protected-first, the CO’s that work there and other inmates-who are risk to the most violent offenders.
I remain convinced that some individuals have committed crimes-that by their nature- merit execution-and that failure to execute them imposes costs and risks on society we should not have to bear.
I am really tired of these episcopal missives-if they were only as concerned with the eternal souls of people as they are the mortal lives of predators.
In my opinion, the illegal animal that raped and killed Laken Riley is an example of an offender that needs to be executed for the safety of others.
Evangelium Vitae offers the prudential judgment that the application of capital punishment should be “very rare, if not practically non-existent” (n. 56), and the Catechism now holds even more narrowly that it should be inadmissible (but still a prudential judgment regarding the use vs the morality of capital punishment?). Synonyms for “inadmissible” do not include immoral: https://www.thesaurus.com/browse/inadmissible
In early response to Evangelium Vitae, Cardinals Ratzinger and Avery Dulles commented…
RATZINGER: “Clearly the Holy Father has not altered the doctrinal principles…but has simply deepened (their) application…in the context of present-day historical circumstances” (National Review, July 10, 1995, p. 14; First Things, Oct. 1995, 83). In a July 2004 letter to former-Cardinal McCarrick—a letter intended for all of the bishops but which came to light only when later leaked to the press—he wrote: “Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia….There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.”
AVERY DULLES: …traditional teachings on “retributive justice” and “vindication of the moral order” are not reversed by John Paul II’s strong “prudential judgment” regarding the use of capital punishment. The pope simply remained silent on these teachings. (“Seven Reasons America Shouldn’t Execute”, National Catholic Register, 3-24-02).
SO, Not to be denied is our post-Christian and not-so-modern world is our coarseness and trivialization of each sacred human life. But, about Idaho’s firing squad, the personal preference of yours truly would be the quickness of the guillotine, really, especially in preference to botched lethal injection…
But, about the noose option, Samuel Johnson said this, maybe about possible conversions: “’Depend upon it, sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.”
The death penalty has nothing to do with the dignity of the criminal, and it’s manipulative and dishonest to frame the issue that way. It’s about the administration of justice.
Yes, execution is about the proper and fair administration of justice, because there are acts of the free will that are so heinous that the perpetrator must pay for the crime by foregoing his or her life. The trial of the nazis at Nuremberg is a specific case in point.
Even in the flurry of those and like executions, we find examples of pre-execution conversions. The example that comes to mind is Rudolf Hoess, former Commandant of Auschwitz. He was tried and sentenced to be hung at a gallows inside the camp.
Moments before the noose was placed around his neck, he repented and asked forgiveness for the atrocities committed under his command.
As Catholics, we would do well to remember the example of Henri Pranzini, a triple-murderer whom St. Therese of Lisieux prayed fervently for and whom, at the guillotine, took the Crucifix from the priest’s hands and kissed the precious wounds three times. Lastly, there is the more recent example, again in France. Jacques Fesch, was executed on the first of September, 1957, the feast of St. Therese of Lisieux, Jacques made his last Confession, and received Holy Communion, offering his life for the conversion of his father, for those he loved, and for the man he had killed.
The point is, no matter how hardened, malevolent and hard-hearted any given criminal may be, they may well remain open to repentance and salvation unto their dying breath.
Our focus as Christians, especially as Catholics, is not on the justice being administered that has the final say. It is the attitude of the condemned in the moments leading up to death that repentance and salvation can still be had by God’s almighty grace. That is, the more we pray for the worst of humanity, the greater the number of souls we wrest from the hands of satn.
Isn’t the judgment that one deserves Hell tantamount to the death penalty? Or, is there no Hell? Or, there is a Hell but no soul is there? Is the judgment of Hell beneath the dignity of any human person?